


"Good"

by spiderfire



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Chess, Gen, Hydra (Marvel), M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, Remixed, once challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-16
Updated: 2014-09-16
Packaged: 2018-02-17 14:29:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2312909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spiderfire/pseuds/spiderfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky wins a chess game in the park.</p>
            </blockquote>





	"Good"

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Febricant](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Febricant/gifts).
  * Inspired by [boom, crack](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1709027) by [Febricant](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Febricant/pseuds/Febricant). 
  * Inspired by [Baby You Should Stick Around](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2236926) by [Febricant](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Febricant/pseuds/Febricant), [neenya](https://archiveofourown.org/users/neenya/pseuds/neenya). 



> This work is a remix of two of Febricant's stories: [boom, crack](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1709027) and [Baby you should stick around](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2236926/chapters/4907736). Both are fabulous. Go read them. They have made me think. A lot.

“Once I…” Bucky stood, frowning down at the chess board. 

It was a sunny Saturday morning and there were half a dozen games going on around him. The concrete park tables had the black and white checkerboard embedded in their tops. In the distance, he could hear the laughter and shouts of kids. 

“Do you play?” 

_He remembered, viscerally. The feel of Pierce’s hand on his shoulder. ”I don’t play games,” he had answered._

_”You will,” he had been told._

There was an old man sitting in a wheel chair at the table. Grey hair, grizzled, glasses. Brown eyes. The man’s hand shook as he gestured at the board. 

Bucky looked at the old man. “I used to,” he answered. 

The man’s face broke into a broad smile, showing crooked, broken teeth. “Ah, it’s like riding a bicycle. You never forget. Sit. Play!” 

Bucky glanced from the table across the park. He could see Steve sitting on a bench, watching as Alex chased some other kid around the playground. He was supposed to be getting a gallon of milk at the convenience store across the street. 

He turned back to the old man. “One game,” he said, sitting in front of the white pieces. 

The old man put a twenty dollar bill on the table. Bucky stared at it for a moment and then matched it. 

At the next table over, a teenager shook his head. “Careful, dude,” he murmured as he moved his horse. “Teddy’s beat all of us.”

Bucky looked at the kid and then at the old man across from him. Without saying anything, he moved the king’s pawn. 

Fifteen minutes later, the players at the other boards started to gather around as their games finished. He had lost a horse, the piece that leaps over and around the obstacles and he had taken one of the pieces that zip across the board in diagonals. 

Thirty minutes later, his phone buzzed. He ignored it. His opponent was taking longer to make his moves now, his brow furrowed. 

Forty-five minutes later he felt more than he heard Steve behind him. Alex said, “What’s Dad doing?” and he heard Steve’s baffled reply, “Playing chess.” 

The end-game was in his sights. Five moves and it would be over. The old man extended his hand towards one of the pieces with bricks for a head and then paused, the hand trembling over the board. He withdrew it and tipped the piece with the crown. 

“I resign,” the old man said. 

There was a crowd watching the game. A shocked hush went through them. In the quiet, Bucky heard Alex’s clear, high voice. “What happened?” 

Bucky looked up at the old man, confused. A surrender. Peirce had never surrendered. Peirce had played each game out to the end, and then he had said _“Good.”_ Even now, he did not like to think what that single word of praise had meant to him. He had clung to it like a downing man clings to anything that floats. It had dug into him like a knife slid between the ribs and twisted. 

_One afternoon year ago, he had been watching Alex on the monkey bars. Alex had swung, twisted, fell and gotten up, over and over again until he had taught himself how to flip around the bar and land on his feet. “Look, Dad!” he had yelled once he figured it out. After showing his trick, Alex had run up to him with a giant grin. Bucky had reached out for Alex and rested his hand, his human hand, on the boy’s shoulder, and said, “Good.” Suddenly, the air had gone from his chest. “Dad?” Alex had asked, but he shook his head grasping for words. “Let’s go home, Alex,” he managed. “You can tell Steve all about it.”_

The crowd around them was dispersing as the old man reset the chess board and pushed the money across to Bucky. “That was a good game, son.” 

Bucky got to his feet and looked to Steve and Alex. He turned back to the old man and suddenly he realized the old man was right. “Yes,” he said, a wisp of a smile coming to his lips. “Yes, it was.”


End file.
